


The Making of a Man

by aleighn



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Childhood, Fear, Gen, Growing Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-31 17:32:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13980045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aleighn/pseuds/aleighn
Summary: Carl Grimes is a child. Loved. Protected (perhaps too much). He’s the apple of his mother’s eye, his father’s pride and joy. His world is perfect…until the world goes to shit, that is. Until his family gets separated. Until dead people start trying to kill him. No, Carl Grimes was not prepared to survive this.





	The Making of a Man

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: Contains references to events of seasons 1-6

Carl Grimes is a child. Loved. Protected (perhaps too much). He’s the apple of his mother’s eye, his father’s pride and joy. His world is perfect…until the world goes to shit, that is. Until his family gets separated. Until dead people start trying to kill him. No, Carl Grimes was not prepared to survive this.

\---

He does what any kid would do: He tries to grow up. Unfortunately, no one seems to want him to. It’s the end of the fucking world, and his mother won’t let him learn how to protect himself. Fortunately, he’s small enough to slip away and do what he wants without her noticing. He takes a gun and gets Shane to teach him how to use it. He’ll deal with the repercussions later. Armed, with his father’s hat perched on his head, Carl Grimes feels quite ready to be a man.

\---

When the barn doors swing open and the walkers pour out, he’s still holding his gun. Everyone is too distracted to notice and take it away. Down the walkers go under a stream of bullets, the ringing of tiny explosions and the dull squelch of metal penetrating flesh drowning everything in his mind. As he pulls the trigger again and again, he feels invincible. All he sees is red…until she appears. Until he hears Carol’s gut-wrenching screams. Until Daryl runs to hold her back. Until his father puts a bullet through Sophia’s head. The gun falls from his nerveless hands. When his friend’s body hits the ground, Carl is nothing but a child.

\---

Carl Grimes knows how to survive. Or at least, he pretends he does. When his mother dies, he puts the bullet through her brain himself, just to make sure it’s all done right and proper. It’s what a man would do. He stands tall, holding his sickening swirl of emotions at bay, and pulls the trigger. As the shot echoes, he wants to scream and break something, but the metallic odor of his mother’s blood reminds him that they need to leave, now. In the dark passageway he rejoins Maggie and his new baby sister and leads them away from the guttural screaming of the walkers. It isn’t until after he’s told his father; watched the grief split Rick’s face like a knife and heard something in his soul break; that he begins to feel like a little boy again. Later that night the tears finally come as he clutches the baby in his lap, wondering where the hell his father is and what the hell he ought to do with this crying infant. He misses his mother. He’s alone. He names the baby Judith and tells her everything will be okay, but he’s not so sure himself as the tears keep sliding down his face and the coils of fear tighten around his heart.

\---

Carl can’t keep track of the amount of times he’s truly believed his father, sister, or friends are dead. Until Alexandria, it was almost a weekly occurrence. Things are different now, though, in comfort and safety. He leaves his father’s old hat hanging in his room, reads comic book and plays video games with the other kids, and talks to Enid for hours on end. He tries to squelch his dislike of Ron, takes care of Judith, worries less…yet the missing weight of the gun at his hip is a reminder, and Carl never quite learned to stop looking out for trouble.

\---

When the child dies as the walkers overrun Alexandria, he should have pulled away from the screaming mother. Instead, he keeps a firm grip on her hand attempting to drag her to safety. When they take her too, and his father has to hack him free of her vice-like grip, he knows he should run. But Carl is still a child, and the blood and sounds of ripping flesh still shock him, on occasion, and he can still feel the dead woman’s hand around his wrist. When he hears the metallic click, he freezes. Ron’s pale face is twisted in anger and grief, and the way he points the gun at Rick leaves Carl drowning in a wave of panic. This is when I lose him for real. As Michonne’s blade parts Ron’s chest, a shot fires and Carl staggers under the unexpected burst of pain ripping through him. He’s surprised at how quickly the burning fades to numbness, though he can sense something hot dripping down his cheek that’s probably blood. “Dad…” He whispers, afraid, looking into his father’s horrified face before everything goes black.

\---

When he wakes up, his right eye is gone. At first, he is overwhelmed. He is, after all, only a boy. The wound is angry and oozing, shifting between excruciating pain and the blessed relief of painkillers. The world seems slightly off-kilter, his once-sure hands seen clumsy and his view is limited. He avoids people…their questions and condolences a painful reminder that he’s broken. One day as he broods on the front porch, Michonne stops to lean against the doorframe. She places the old sheriff’s hat in his lap and slips away without a word. It takes him a moment, but he picks it up with trembling fingers, turning it in his hands. The rough brown felt bears the memories of the past few years in stains and weather marks, and he lets it remind him of who he is.

He learns to accept the raw, rope-like scar tissue and gaping hole that take up a quarter of his face, though he still covers it with a bandage. He ignores the pitying looks. He grows accustomed to holding his gun in his left hand, and soon enough he’s an even better marksman than before. He strides through town confidently, shoulders thrown back and the old hat at home again on his head. No one can call Carl Grimes a child any more. There’s a firmer set around his mouth, a steely glint in his remaining eye. Carl Grimes is a man, and he sure as hell is going to survive this.


End file.
